


These Bonds Are Shackle Free

by Alcoholic_kangaroo



Category: Death Note (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Darkfic, F/M, M/M, Pedophilia, Rape, Sadism, Voyeurism, none of these boys are good people
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-03
Updated: 2020-04-05
Packaged: 2021-03-01 00:26:50
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 2
Words: 9,361
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23456242
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Alcoholic_kangaroo/pseuds/Alcoholic_kangaroo
Summary: To try to force the boys to get along, L brings back the "let's handcuff each other together" technique. How well is that going to go? Will it straighten them up?
Relationships: L/Matt | Mail Jeevas, L/Near | Nate River, Matt | Mail Jeevas/Mello | Mihael Keehl, Matt | Mail Jeevas/Near | Nate River, Mello | Mihael Keehl/Near | Nate River, Near | Nate River/Original Female Character(s)
Comments: 29
Kudos: 35





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Maybe L hasn't done the best job at mentoring his pupils.

“Mello raped me.”

“Again?” L asks, looking up from the piece of cake he has been picking at and seeing the pale young man standing in the doorway. He’s holding his stuffed pig that L bought him last Christmas, it’s half the size of his own body and nearly as cute. Though L doubts he has ever seen any animal as cute as a young Near. He is not so young now, however. “You know it isn’t rape if you were just too timid to ask for it.”

“I didn’t want it,” Near says, scowling over his plushie. He shuffles into L’s sitting room, limping visibly, and L watches him, wondering how much of it is authentic and how much is exaggeration. He is almost positive it is mostly for show but Near is one of his pupils and it is almost a blow to his ego if he were to accept that Near was unable to convincingly fake such pain by the age of eighteen.

“Then you should do better at defending yourself,” L suggests listlessly. He turns away from the boy and returns to the laptop in front of him. It’s early yet and they will both move downstairs to the main headquarters, but not for another hour or two. Not until Matt is awake and Mello has sobered up. Only L and Near are awake and coherent this early.

“He is bigger than me,” Near protests, standing at L’s side. He holds the pig between him and his mentor and L wonders if it is there to ward off another attack. He catches the antiseptic smell of semen wafting off him. The boy could at least bathe before coming here.

“Yet you continue to put yourself in situations where you have direct contact with him,” L points out. He reaches out to touch the pig and Near takes a step back, eying L’s sugar-sticky hands with distaste. L shows no reaction but smiles inside, knowing that was exactly how he would react. “There is no reason you should find yourself alone with Mello, yet this is the second time this week he has allegedly raped you.”

“I was getting breakfast,” Near states, still scowling. “He accosted me as I was pouring cereal into a bowl.

“Are you harmed?” L asks, drawling out his disinterest on the entire tedious subject. “Do you need medical attention? Are you bleeding?”

“No,” Near confesses, haltingly. “It hurts but there was no tearing.”

“Then please stop complaining,” L requests with a roll of his dark eyes. “You are already late for today’s assignment and you will get over it soon enough. Mello never complains like you do. You are fortunate that I have already agreed to take you on as my apprentice with this constant, forgive my pun, melodrama.”

“Mello never gets raped,” Near grumbles, but he sits down on the floor at the base of L’s chair, reaching for his own laptop. The pig sits beside him, watching over him, and L is thankful when he goes quiet and concentrates back on his work.

He should know better than to make a big deal about sex. L has taught them, all three of them, to treat sex no differently than any other bodily need. Of course, it would be mildly annoying being forced into a situation by Mello, he is rough with both Near and Matt when he takes them, but it is no worse than being roughed up by a school bully. Less so, even, since Mello usually does his best not to leave physical marks on either of them. Matt never complains about it like this. He doesn’t love it, but he doesn’t complain about it.

Besides, Near does much worse to those little girls he brings home. L has seen the blood on Near’s usually pristine pajamas.

“I will have a talk with him,” L announces after a while. An hour later, two hours later; sometimes time moves incredibly fast and sometimes it moves agonizingly slow. L is unsure how time is working today. “It would be best if you two would cease this squabbling. He has the entire world to take his anger out upon and I agree that he is starting to go a little overboard.”

It has been a little over five years since L moved the three boys into his house and started working with them with a more hands-on approach. He had wanted to start their training earlier but both Watari and Roger had been insistent on letting Near reach the age of thirteen before they were willing to release the pale boy into his custody. Seeing as L did not like to repeat himself, including in lessons, Mello and Matt had been even older by then.

While L has not specified which of the three is to be his successor, if something were to happen to him in the immediate future, he knows the real competition is between Mello and Near, with Matt trailing far behind the other boys. He is smart enough but simply lacks the drive of the other two. Still, L likes having him around, he’s a good mediator for the other two and he knows computers. With Aiber and Wedy dead he needs more support people.

Some days, he leans towards Near. Near is levelheaded. He is extremely intelligent. He is also more consistent. Reliability is important when it comes to solving cases and sometimes Mello disappears for weeks at a time on one of his benders. Yet Near is also all but socially inept. That is why he prefers the company of the demographic with the least amount of power on Earth.

L does not know where Near gets the little girls. Playgrounds, perhaps. Maybe he frequents Girl Scout meetings in his free time. He just knows they’re never the same girl. Sometimes they’re blond, sometimes they’re brunette. They’re very young. Younger than Near was the first time L touched him. Five, six, seven, L thinks. He does not converse with any of them long enough to gauge their level of education, even though Near does sometimes bring them to meet him. L is never quite sure why and how he chooses which girls to bring. He thinks they are Near’s favorites and perhaps it is a way of gloating, of showing off to L what he has brought home, like a child rushing into the kitchen to present to their mother some art project from school.

Near is so white it was disconcerting the first time L met him – white hair, white skin, white clothes. The absence of color. The absence of everything, a fact that had it made it very easy for L to mold him as he wished. He lacks the fire and personality that Mello has possessed since a very young age. There is little he ever wants or needs, and he causes L little trouble.

Except for this thing with the girls.

He takes them to his bedroom where he makes up for his absence of color by apparently living in the inside of a rainbow. It looks like the room of a small child with all the toys and color. The green carpet, the blue walls, the white clouds and the colorful painted birds and kites. He has an enormous dollhouse - not some cheap plastic Barbie doll mass-manufactured mess but a beautifully handcrafted dollhouse he had commissioned with wooden furniture, silk draperies, and porcelain fixtures. He always brings the little girls there first because little girls like dolls and Near likes to make little girls happy. Before he traumatizes them for life, anyway.

L knows this because he has seen it. Matt tapes everything that goes on inside of this building. Even L doesn’t know where all the cameras are though he assumes that any given time he is being watched by one of his protégés. There are at least ten cameras in Near’s room and Matt brings up four of them on the different screens at his own workstation. He points to them as L shuffles behind him, heading towards his own chair.

“This is the third one in the past week,” he says excitedly. “Think he’s getting more confident with himself or something.”

Matt had been eating potato chips while he watched the screens and he offered one to L, but he had declined, preferring sweet snacks over salty, as he is sure Matt knew he would. He halted behind him for a few seconds, observing his youngest protégé with mild interest.

It seemed innocent enough. Near really did enjoy playing with his toys and he and the small girl were playing dolls as innocently and carefree as two children of the same age would. Near had been sixteen then and looked younger, maybe about twelve, and L wondered what he told these girls to lure them in. Did he claim to be younger than he was? Did he tell them he has an entire room of toys? Did he claim to know their mothers? Even if they did think he was only twelve or thirteen, that was too old for a child of that age, let alone a boy, to play dollhouse.

“He always starts with the dolls,” Matt explains. “I think they’re the only toys he’ll let them touch.

The dolls talked to each other and Near showed the girl his boxful of cute dresses and skirts so they could take time dressing them up.

Growing bored, L had turned back to his work, forgetting that Near was alone with one of his little paramours. Until Matt called for his attention once more.

The two children had moved and now Near had one hand inside the girl’s blouse and another up her skirt. She was crying and asking him to stop, if L’s lipreading was accurate. Near’s face was turned to the side and even from the multiple angles he could not quite catch the boy’s response.

“He has no finesse,” Matt complains, as if he was critiquing some bad reality television program. “Watch any minute now-oh, there we go.”

Near picked up the girl and carried her over to the bed. Near himself was still so small that it was a testament to how tiny the girl must have been that he was able to do so without too much of a struggle. He was not overly harsh with the girl, he did not mean to harm her like Mello does with his victims, but Near understands very little about the human conditions and cares to learn even less. That day he had not even bothered to undress the child. He removed the little pink panties with the purple flowers and shoved her blouse up, exposing her flat, pre-pubescent chest, but otherwise he took her fully clothed, even her little, shiny black shoes still strapped to her feet.

There was blood when he entered the struggling girl but that was to be expected. Unless she had been molested by another man at one point then it was normal to assume she had been a virgin. She had cried and pushed at Near’s shoulders but Near gave no mind to her reaction and continued on with the action. He enjoyed sitting back on his knees and watching his cock as it disappeared inside her, framed by the frills of her tutu-like skirt.

When L looked towards Matt his eyes were wide and he was shoving potato chips into his mouth still. This was like some blockbuster movie he had been waiting for. When L had glanced down though there had been no indication of any sexual enjoyment of the act on Matt’s side. He watched these performances like a man who slowed down to look at car crashes on a freeway.

They all have their peculiarities. Mello has developed a mean streak. Or a sadistic streak, to be specific. He enjoys causing pain and disappears nearly every evening, coming home usually drunk and often with a scar or two to add to his collection. Near is as quiet and isolated as he has ever been but with this sexual perversion. L has never questioned him about it, but it is rather obvious that the boy seeks out little girls because they are safe – they cannot hurt him. Or maybe he just is attracted to small girls. Then you have Matt. With his cameras and his always excited gaze just watching, watching, watching.

Sadism. Pedophilia. Voyeurism. L has nurtured a strange trio of perversions at his breast.

Matt’s voyeuristic tendencies go perfectly with the other two. He loves to watch Near with his girls. He loves to listen to Mello’s stories when he returns home each night. Near never mentions knowing he is being watched but L has no doubt he is aware of this fact. Either he doesn’t care or perhaps he enjoys it, having an audience. Sometimes it is difficult to tell with him.

On the morning of Mello’s 18th birthday, just before 3 AM to be exact, there had come a knock on L’s bedroom door. He had not been asleep, of course, L rarely slept, but that was still not normal. However, it was Mello’s birthday and L was willing to forgive some transgression. It was likely that Mello just returned from one of those raves he enjoys and was reeking of sweet cocktails and sweat. Undoubtedly, he was high on life, realizing he was now a man, and wished to share it with somebody. Mello is not really close to anybody, unfortunately. None of them are.

“I killed a man,” Mello had blurted out instantly. There had been something almost scary about his face then. The ecstasy in his eyes, maybe. Or the twisted way his lips smiled. He had definitely been on something. Some sort of upper that had him walking on clouds, fearless and immortal.

“How did it feel?” L asked, stepping aside so his protégé could enter his bedroom. The lights were dim, and it made the light in Mello’s eyes sparkle.

“Amazing,” Mello gushed, holding his hands out in two fists before him. “I shot him in the head. He tried to pick me up in the bathroom and I told him I wasn’t interested, and he called me a pretty boy, so I shot him in the head.” Then he seemed suddenly distracted by his hands, the appendages shaking in front of him for emphasis as he spoke. The fingers uncurled and he looked at him palms in wonder. “There is blood on my hands, do you see it?”

There had been no blood on his hands.

“That is gun powder on your hands,” L replied. “You may not be able to see it, but it is there. I suggest you wash them immediately.”

“It’s blood,” Mello insisted, his voice near hysterics. He began to laugh. “Let’s fuck. I want to wipe the man’s blood all over your gorgeous face.”

There used to be a time when L never would have dreamed about letting any of the boys top him. That day, the day Mello became a man, was the day L lost his own anal virginity. It was nice and he let him do it again in the future. He enjoyed sex with Near better, however. Near was smaller and softer and he always hid his face when L took him. He always pretended he hated it when L touched him.

Matt went about it like it was a chore. He let L fuck him and he let Mello fuck him, but he was not particularly interested in sex with another person. L would not necessarily say he was asexual, but he did seem to be more invested in characters in the video games he loved than living, breathing human beings. Even the one and only time he fucked Near he had needed to be high on some drug Mello had slipped between his lips. Not something as basic as Viagra. MDMA, most likely. Mello had offered it to L and Near as well, the pills had been small and pink, and he had promised L they tasted like Sweet Tarts. But only Matt had taken one because Mello had not requested it of him, he had commanded him. Matt will do anything that either Mello or L tell him to do. It’s a nice feature in a protégé.

That may have been the only time L ever saw Matt so affectionate with another person. He had rubbed against Mello like a friendly cat then plopped himself onto L’s lap, begging for a kiss. Even high out of his mind he had left Near alone. Until Mello commanded him to fuck him, that is. Near had complained and tried to leave the room at that point but Mello had been quicker than him. Mello is always quicker than him.

But Matt had been sweet with Near that day and Near had just let it happen because he knew it was better to have Matt touching him then Mello. Near always just lets it happen.

Near claims he is not interested in men. He always cries rape, whether it be Mello, or Matt, or L himself. But L has been having sex with the boy since he was ten and he has never failed to orgasm. He doubts Near knows what his own sexuality is. He may be attracted to males; he may not be. But he always enjoys sex with them, no matter his objections.

The second time Mello killed a man he did come back with blood on his hands.

“I stabbed him,” he told L this time. And L can see that when he looks at him. There is blood on his hands, his bare arms, his bare midriff which shows just a bit in his skimpy, tight, black-leather clubbing outfit. There is blood on his face, in his hair. “I stabbed him. Again and again and again.”

“Did you get rid of the knife?” L inquires.

“I, I can’t remember,” Mello confesses. There is almost a sense of wonderment there now in those eyes the same color and depth of the water off a Hawaiian beach. “It’s a blur. I don’t remember letting go of it.”

L fucked him that time. But Mello reached up in the middle of it to grab at L’s throat and L had to punch him in the face more than once to get him to let go. Mello laughed, throwing his arm over his eyes, then he moaned. His stomach tightened and he was as lithe and loose as a big cat beneath L after that. The blond left a bloody ring around his mentor’s collar.

A little while later, they sent Matt downstairs to clean the blood out of the car and he returned with a bloody knife, holding it by the handle with a fluffy blue towel. He spoke around the cigarette clenched between his teeth and L had observed, with mild annoyance, the ash that fell on the carpet.

“What do we want to do with this?”

L had wished, then, for Watari. Watari always knew how to handle these sorts of situations.

Watari never did wish for the boys to join him. Not so young, anyway. He thought it was best they finish their education, enjoy a few years away at a university, then return to join him in their rightful roles as L’s apprentices. Waiting until they were all teenagers had been L’s compromise. He never thought doing so would lead to Watari resigning.

Well, no. Not resigning. Not exactly. He still is in charge of L’s finances. He still makes sure somebody pays the employees; the car insurance bills. He has food delivered to the house once a week and the woman he hired to clean and cook for them brings it all in and puts it away. But she is not allowed within most of the house. They drop their used clothing down the chutes in their rooms and she retrieves them from the basement. Whenever L orders a dessert she wheels it as far as to the door in the long hallway that divides the airy, open living space from the headquarters area.

L still misses Watari, sometimes. He misses having somebody there to read his mind and get him what he wanted before he wanted it. He misses having somebody always there, following him, cleaning up after him. He misses knowing that if he needed something, anything, all he had to do was turn around and the man would be there. He has had to become an adult since he left him, and he doesn’t like it.

Again, Matt is good to have around. Matt is practical. He bleaches the knife and then he melts it and now the knife is no longer a knife but two identical little silver dice that he gifted to Near as a present. Still, it is no good to have Mello running around acting like a maniac, and L tells him he has to shape up.

“We do not kill people just because they annoy us,” L tells him. “We are supposed to be the good guys here. You cannot just run around cutting up people like some crazy serial killer.”

“I’ve saved thousands of more people than I’ve killed,” Mello reminds him. But he gets the message. It is a long time until he kills another man and the third time, he does it to defend himself from being raped in one of those alleys where he buys his drugs and L does not object. A criminal is a criminal after all.

He wonders if this is how it would feel to be Echidna. Echidna, the mother of monsters, was frightful in her own right as a half-snake, half-woman goddess, but her children far outdid her in their own existences. Cerberus, Scylla, the Hydra, the Chimera, the Sphinx, the Nemean Lion. If L is the mother, then which children are they? Near is easy enough, the Sphinx lying forever on the ground telling riddles. The other two?

L lets go of the train of thought. A metaphor can only carry you so far.

He is proud of his little monsters. They are his creations. Yes, at this moment they are overly reckless, but they are young, and they carry too much on their shoulders for boys their age. They will mature. They will not change. He does not want them to change. But they will mature. Mello will learn to take his anger out on the right people. Near will show more discretion. Matt will…

Well, Matt is perfectly fine.

Maybe L chose wrong when he excluded him from his candidacy.

That evening, after their work is complete for the day, he calls them into the living room. Matt is already there, set up on the couch with his snacks and his video games, his booted feet up on the table. Near comes next. He has changed out of his pajamas into a pair of pale beige slacks and a soft, cream-colored sweater. He is going out. He never changes out of his pajamas unless he is going out. Mello is last and he is dressed in his party clothes. There are bangles around his biceps and glitter on his face. His skimpy leather vest sits inches above his naval.

“I have an idea,” L announces slowly, methodically. “Once upon a time, I was handcuffed to a teenage boy.”

“Light Yagami,” Near says, stating the obvious for they all know the story. He leans against the back of the couch and plays with his hair, looking annoyed. He wants to be out there on the playgrounds, in the arcades, looking for innocent young flesh.

“Yes, Light Yagami,” L agrees, then adds after a few moments, “Kira. As I was saying. I was handcuffed to this boy for quite awhile and I came to understand him because of this prolonged proximity. Knowing him, understanding him, is what led to me being able to capture him before he had the chance to kill me.”

“What does this have to do with the current case?” Mello asks. He has draped himself across Matt’s lap, one arm around the redhead’s neck. Matt pays him no attention and reaches for another cigarette.

“Absolutely nothing,” L replies. “This is about your training. At this rate, I do not see you three being able to work together in the foreseeable future, especially if I am not around to keep you in check. Apart you boys are good, but only together can we represent the justice of the world.”

“I don’t like where this is going,” Near mutters. He tugs at his hair harder. Matt mumbles an agreement and inhales from his cigarette. Mello is looking at his phone.

“To know your enemy, you must live like your enemy. To know your colleague, you must live like your colleague. Starting tomorrow at nine, I will be handcuffing us in sets of two so we may come to understand and empathize with each other.”

“What?” Mello finally gets what the other two already had and looks up; his eyes are filled with panic. “You can’t make us do that!”

“I don’t have to make you do anything,” L replies, “You’re all adults. You know you are always free to leave this house, Mello.”

“And give Near the title?” Mello sneers. He climbs out of Matt’s lap and takes his spot beside Near. Taller than him by over half a foot. He crosses his arms across his chest. “Okay, but I get Matt.”

“You get Near,” L informs him, his voice definite and uncompromising. “It was your repeating assaulting of him that helped me come up with this idea in the first place. I will be with Matt. I feel there is a lot about Matt I could benefit from learning.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kangaroo, stop making everyone a pedo challenge?
> 
> No. 
> 
> I actually do headcanon Near growing up to be a pedo. No particular reason. Just because I headcanon something doesn't mean I always write it but the two headcanons I have had for years for Near is 1. He was a child prostitute and 2. He grows up to be into little girls

L is meticulous. Exactly as he promised, at 9:00 on the dot, he brought out the handcuffs. They’re not trick handcuffs or costume handcuffs but heavy metal police cuffs that he must have actually procured from a police department at one point or another because who the hell just has real handcuffs hanging around?

Mello and Near went first, standing as far apart as they could while still allowing for the cuffs to be slipped onto their wrists. L carefully tightened them and tugged to make sure they would not slip over either of the boy’s hands. He even asked Near to make a tight fist and try to remove the cuffs because Near is small and flexible, but it stuck fast at the knuckles.

L nodded in satisfaction then then asked Near to help him and Matt put on their own cuffs.

“Do you have a preference over which hand?” L was nice enough to ask Matt. He had not asked Mello and Near that question and Near had lost the use of his left hand and Mello his right. At least Near would still be able to line up Dominoes with precision. Matt told him that he needed his right hand free for video games.

“Alright, seeing as we have no urgent matters with the current case at this exact moment, I feel a day off would do us all some good. Please take this opportunity to get to know each other a bit more and learn how to work together. You do not know how difficult it can be to lose the use of one of your hands until it happens, I am afraid.”

Mello wanted to go to his room and sleep. Near wanted to go to his room and play. They ended up in the living room, Mello lying on his back and Near on the floor beside him, trying to construct a Lego building with only one hand. It had sounded easier than it ended up being and he wishes, repeatedly, that he had brought some other toys along seeing as how Mello would not even allow him to stop by his bedroom to pick out a few.

“I hope you don’t expect me to just sit around as you play with toys all day,” Mello mutters, his eyes closed. He kept tugging his arm back to lie on the couch beside him but Near keeps moving it just enough that it falls to the side, Mello's fingers brushing the floor beside him. Every time it happens Mello leaves it for a few minutes then lifts it back to his side.

“This is all your fault,” Near reminds him testily. He tugs at his hand again, having difficulty snapping together the blocks. “If you hadn’t been raping and killing whoever you wanted then L wouldn’t have made us do this.”

“Right, this is all my fault,” Mello drawls lazily. He’s covering his eyes with his free hand and Near can’t help but think he looks like a lady who had just fainted from some old black and white movie set in the deep south. Especially with his long hair fanned out on the throw pillow behind him. “I haven’t offed a guy in nearly a year. How many little girls have you diddled in just the past month?”

Near sighs, closing his eyes. It has been twenty minutes and he already feels like he’s ready to strangle the other man. He rustles through the pile of blocks, looking for a two by two piece. He finds one but not in the right color.

“Do you even listen to L when he speaks?” Near hisses, angry at Mello and angry at the blocks and even angry at L right now. “He said he wants us to learn to work together. My sexual practices have nothing to do with that. You kept assaulting Matt and I and that’s why L is making us do this.”

“But you’re the one who went whining to him,” Mello replies. He pulls back his arm and tries to turn over, so his back is facing Near, but they do not have enough chain for that and Near refuses to budge. He is small but stubborn and pulls back, resisting the movement. Giving up on getting any sleep, Mello sits up, swinging his legs over the side of the couch, and reaches for the candy bowl L always keeps on the side table in the room. “Matt never bitches about it. If you hadn’t been bitching about getting laid, then he wouldn’t have cared.”

“Getting laid? Is that what the kids are referring to rape as these days?” Near quips. But he’s secretly glad for Mello’s change in position because now his hand is free enough that he can use it to snap the blocks together more easily.

Mello rolls his eyes and takes a bite of his chocolate bar. It’s milk chocolate. Mello likes dark chocolate better. He likes the way it snaps. Milk chocolate is too soft unless you freeze it.

“If you weren’t such a little bitch about it, I wouldn’t bother. You know that.” Mello accuses and it’s true. The only reason he enjoys fucking Near so much is because he clearly hates it. He always struggles and squirms and breathes angrily between his teeth. Matt is fun to have sex with because he’s attractive and accommodating and makes nice noises and cute faces when he’s on top of him. But Near? “What, do you think you’re that attractive? Or you’re that great a lay?”

“I hate you.”

“Not more than I hate you.”

He’s trying to figure out how this is going to work. Mello cannot be stuck inside of headquarters for an indefinite amount of time. He just cannot. He’d catch cabin fever. He’d go insane. He’d end up chewing off his own hand like a fox with its foot caught in a trap. But he also can’t imagine being seen walking around in public handcuffed to a sheep.

Unless…

* * *

“Come on, you look fine, stop being a pussy.”

“I look like I should be dancing in a cage with tassels hanging from my nipples.”

“If you don’t get your ass out here then I’ll make that happens before the night is over.”

Reluctantly, Near crawls out of the car. He isn’t wrong, about the part with the cage dancing that is.

“Mello, please,” he pleads, hesitating. He’s standing on the ground now but still shielded by the car door. His arms are crossed across his stomach, his hands covering his chest. “I cannot be seen in public like this. Let’s go home.”

“We had an agreement,” Mello reminds him, giving a small tug at the chain. “Tomorrow we do what you want. Unless you just want to sit around the house the whole time?”

Near is quiet, looking down at the ground. The black oil-stained concrete. At the white leather boots laced up the side to his calves, only a shade or two paler than his own skin color.

“Come on,” Mello prods, sweetening his tone just a tad. “I promise, you won’t stand out in this club. Besides, do you know how much I had to pay to get that outfit delivered same day?”

Near sighs. He knows money is not an issue but he also knows this is the only way he will get to do what he wants tomorrow. He lets his arms drop and Mello grins, looking at him. Inspecting the white leather booty shorts with the cross stitching on the sides. The white leather sleeveless top that barely even covers Near’s nipples. The soft looking collar around his throat that Near had protested against most of the entire ensemble.

“Xanatos,” the bouncer, a beefy looking man with a goatee, greets him, but he’s looking at the smaller of the two boys, clearly surprised. “You know the rules, no pets without a leash.”

“He has a medical condition,” Mello lies, smoothly. He’s holding out two fake ID’s with some money tucked under them. “Can’t put too much pressure on his throat or could damage his larynx for life. Look, I have him claimed.” He lifts his hand, showing off the shackles. “He has the collar; he just can’t have the leash on it.”

The bouncer seems to be thinking about it but Near can tell by their familiarity, by the surprise the man had shown over Mello bringing a guest, that they know each other, and Mello holds some clout at this club. He agrees, finally, hands back the IDs, sans money, and stamps both their hands. They’re both simple black ink but Mello’s is in the shape of a D and Near’s is that of an S.

The first thing he notices once they’re inside is that there are a lot of men and there is a lot of bare skin. There are also cages with dancers inside of them, as Mello promised, moving to the loud techno beat of the music that makes it almost impossible for him to hear Mello yelling over it. But the dancers are all much taller than Near and leaner with visible six-packs. Near is lithe but he is soft, and he breathes a sign of relief knowing there is no way that he would be allowed inside one. Unless Mello really does have that much clout.

“Come on,” Mello yells into his ear, pulling Near along by the cuffs. “Let’s get some liquor inside you.”

“I don’t drink,” Near protests. He doesn’t yell but he is sure Mello can read his lips. Reading lips is one of Mello’s special talents. He’s ever better than L at it, maybe because Mello is just good as predicting what people are going to say before they say it.

“You do now,” the taller blond yells back over the music. He knows, with some satisfaction, that Near is not that great at reading lips. Near does not even like looking at people’s lips. Near prefers to not look at people, period, if it can be helped.

“No, I don’t,” Near insists. He digs his heels into the floor and pulls back against Mello. The cuffs dig into his wrist, the metal scraping against his delicate bones.

“Believe me,” Mello insists, pulling back. “You’re going to want a couple drinks in you.”

The bar is off the main area. There is no door, just a wide, open doorway, but the walls still help mute much of the noise from the front room. Near is thankful because he already feels like he has a headache coming on.

The bartender is a handsome man with short brown hair and pierced nipples and Near wonders if it is even legal to serve alcohol half naked. Wouldn’t it be against public hygiene laws? He recognizes Mello and greets him with a more than friendly smile, his eyes going half lidded and Near is absolute certain Mello has had sex with this man.

Mello greets him with a simple, “Hey Nico, the usual.”

“You brought a pet, Xanatos?” Nico asks, his eyes scanning up and down Near’s scantily clad form as he sits uncomfortable on one of the metal stools with the shovel seats. He hates stools. He can’t pull his leg up to his chest as he prefers, even though he attempts to do so, unsuccessfully. The cushion digs at his crotch, rubbing against the leather, and Near wonders if that is supposed to be a feature of these stools. Mello sits on the one next to him with a fluid grace that Near lacks entirely. “What happened to the no boyfriend rule?”

“He’s not my boyfriend,” Mello says, looking slightly disgusted at the idea. “He’s…a friend of a friend. I just agreed to bring him along so he could get past Vince.”

“Come on now,” the bartender teases, leaning on his elbows so he can talk more intimately with Mello. “A cute little thing like him? I don’t see him having any trouble getting in on his own.” He turns to Near with a welcoming smile. “What can I get you sweetie?”

“I don’t drink,” Near responds moodily, his fingers already itching for some sort of distraction. Something to stack or line up. He reaches for a napkin, but Mello moves it out of his way.

“He means he hasn’t had the opportunity to try enough drinks yet to know what he likes,” Mello explains, ignoring Near’s protests. “Make him a Long Island Iced Tea.”

“Got it.”

“What’s in a Long Island Iced Tea?” Near asks once Nico has turned to begin making their drinks. There’s a tattoo on his lower back of a bleeding knife with a black handle. Gaudy. “Does it use Earl Grey?”

“There is no actual tea in a Long Island Iced Tea,” Mello responds. He half turns on his stool to look around behind them, inspecting the crowd. Near feels mildly annoyed. He doesn’t want to be here, but he also feels like he should be enough company for Mello on his own. Who is he looking for? “In fact, tea might be the only thing that isn’t in a Long Island Iced Tea.”

“What does that mean?” Near questions, uneasy over this implication. Did Mello just order him a drink with roofies? If Mello wanted to rape him, he’d just do it. What if he was planning to kill him? He could off him then cut off Near’s hand at the wrist, freeing himself. Tell L that something happened to him.

No, that’s a stupid idea. L would never believe such an obvious lie. Especially on their first night of this experiment.

Mello smiles and shrugs languidly. His long blond hair falls over his bared shoulder and for a moment Near is distracted by how pretty Mello can be when he isn’t scowling and ordering him around. Luckily that moment is quickly cut short because Nico is back, setting a drink in front of Mello. It is brown and smells like a Tootsie Roll. Mello turns back to the counter to pick it up, his hair falling back in place and shielding his profile from Near’s view.

“Is that a girly drink?” Near asks, humor in his voice. He doesn’t know why he had assumed Mello would favor anything besides a chocolate-based cocktail but somehow, he had pictured Mello drinking something more masculine – a gin and tonic perhaps. Or an Old Fashioned.

“Shut up,” Mello says coolly but there is no venom in his voice, not really. He seems…relaxed here. In a way that he is never relaxed inside what should be the sanctuary of his home. Near can almost understand that feeling. The only place he feels truly at ease is inside his own bedroom. Surrounded by his toys.

Near’s drink takes longer to make. He sits at the bar, tapping his finger, watching Nico add shot after shot of alcohol to the tumbler. He catches Near watching him and winks. Near doesn’t react but he’s somewhat disturbed. He does not understand these bizarre mating rituals.

“It’s on the house,” the bartender says, but then the bill he tucks into the glass and sets before them still shows full prices for both drinks, confusing Near. Mello’s drink is slightly more expensive than his own.

“Give me that,” Mello grumbles, ripping the paper from his hands. “Subs don’t look at the prices of drinks, don’t you know anything?”

“Subs?” Near asks, though he already gets it even as the word escapes. “I’m not your submissive, Mello.”

“The collar around your throat says otherwise,” the blond taunts. He reaches up to push his hair behind one ear and again Near can’t help but think how much nicer he looks when he’s not stomping around full of anger. Despite his words there is a lightness in his voice. “Shut up and finish your drink.”

Finish? He hasn’t even started it. Near picks it up. The glass is cold and wet with condensation. It’s the color of generic cola but it doesn’t smell horrible when he sniffs it. He takes a sip. It’s not the best thing he’s ever drank but it’s not _bad_. He sips at it slowly through a pink and white straw, removing the matching tiny umbrella when it brushes against the bridge of his nose. Things are a hazard, really, probably taken out more than one eye since they were invented.

“So, this is where you go every night?” Near asks, looking around at the place. Really looking at it now that he’s over being stunned by half-naked men walking around and dancers in the cages. The lighting is darker in this part of the club, and even. Near can see the flashing lights from the other side. Red, yellow, blue, green, red again. In this area, the bar area, the lighting is just blue. Looking at Mello again, he thinks maybe that is why Mello looks so pretty in this lighting. The blue gives him a serene glow.

“Of course not,” Mello says with a roll of his eyes. “You think I go to the same bar every night? Do you go to the same playground every afternoon?”

“Mello,” Near hisses, looking around, paranoid that somebody had heard him.

Mello just laughs and takes another sip of his drink. Then he surprises Near by holding it out to him. “Try a sip.”

“Oh,” Near blinks, startled. He shakes his head. “No thank you.”

“Just try it. Here, give me yours, I haven’t had one in forever. Jesus fuck, Nico made this strong. What did he put in it, paint remover?”

Near sips at the chocolate concoction in Mello’s martini glass but it tastes exactly as it smells and Near is not the biggest fan of chocolate. He holds it back out to Mello; his nose scrunched up in distaste.

“You know, Near,” Mello says, and his voice is oddly jovial. “If you actually acquired a taste for chocolate it would be for your benefit. Could use it to pick up a date. Have you tried Girl Scout cookies?”

“You know I haven’t,” Near responds. He wishes he had brought his phone along, but Mello had made sure they both left them in the car.

“They have a big no photography rule,” he had explained earlier, checking his makeup in the mirror before they went inside. He hadn’t put on much, just some eyeliner and a little glitter across the bridge of his nose. “Privacy issues, you know.”

It wasn’t the worse evening though Near still would have preferred to be sitting in his bedroom playing with his toys. Alone. But Mello was in a good mood and he was avoiding being too confrontational with Near so that was something to be grateful about.

A few of the men recognized Mello and stopped by to chat with him, flirt with him, and a few even attempted to flirt with Near though he just stared at them with the stony expression he first mastered as a small child, shutting down any of their attempts. They asked Mello if they were up for swapping or sharing. They all referred to him by that ridiculous pseudonym, Xanatos. Some even asked him if he had been at so and so other club earlier that evening or that week or last weekend, meaning he must not just use that name here but elsewhere as well.

“Do they really think your name is Xanatos?” Near asks after one of the men saunters away, giving one last wink in Mello’s direction. He’s surprised by how mushy his words come out. He’s on his second drink and the world is starting to get fuzzy along the edges. “It’s so fake sounding it makes me feel embarrassed to even be seen with you.”

“Ditto,” Mello replies. He traces his finger along the rim of his glass, scooping up the chocolate rock candy that coats it. Near watches him lick the candy from his thumb, unsure if he should feel disgusted or not. “But no, it’s obviously not my real name and I chose it for that reason. You’re in a gay bondage club, Near, how many men here do you think use fake names? Do you think they want their one-night stands Googling them on Facebook and posting come ons where granny and their ex-wives can see?”

“I suppose that’s true,” Near agrees, reaching up with his right hand, his free hand, to twirl one of his curls around his finger. Even this familiar action feels strange, his arm feels heavy and Near closes his eyes for a moment as the world spins. “I feel weird.”

“That’s because you’re drunk,” Mello laughs. It sounds like an echo. Near has to open his eyes again because he feels dizzy with them closed.

“I don’t like it,” Near confesses, his voice so quiet than he is unsure if Mello even hears him. “I feel like I’m about to fall off my stool. The world is sideways.”

“You’re supposed to feel like that,” Mello promises him. He reaches down to pat Near’s hand, the one with the cuff on the wrist, and Near watches him do so. It feels like he’s moving in slow motion and it takes a few moments before Near realizes how weird it is that Mello is willingly touching him in a way that is anything but violent.

“I can’t think right,” he continues. “I don’t think I could solve any puzzles like this. I’m…I’m scared, Mello.”

“It will go away,” Mello reminds him. His voice is still hollow sounding but there is an unusual warmth there. “It can be frightening the first few times but just remember that, it will go away.”

It will go away. Near thinks about that and Mello is right. This is just a temporary condition. Near used to be scared of vivid dreams, when he was younger. He would suddenly realize he was in a dream and he would become scared because he was trapped. There was no way to wake yourself up from a vivid dream. Then he came to realize that it didn’t matter if he was dreaming, he was just inside his own head and he could do whatever he wanted in his own dreams. He could play with toys or fly through the sky or have an orgy of little girls. He would always wake up, eventually.

This is like that. He will wake up in the morning and he will feel normal.

“My drink is nearly empty,” he says, looking at the crushed ice melting on the bottom of his glass.

“Then let me buy you another.”

This offer does not come from his companion but a man that appears to pop up out of nowhere at Near’s elbow. He actually jumps, taken by surprise, banging his knee on the underside of the bar. They both look over to see a man with broad shoulders and about four days’ worth of stubble on his chin. He must be in his thirties, maybe forties. He’s wearing only leather straps across his chest, held together by metal rings that glint in the blue lighting.

“Name’s Andrew,” he introduces, offering his hand to Near. He looks down at it as if he’s never shaken a person’s hand in his life and does not react. After a moment Andrew withdraws the hand, raking his fingers through his hair as he tries to play off the awkward interaction. “You are?”

“Clearly attached to me,” Mello replies, scowling at the stranger. “Fuck off.”

“You don’t have him collared,” the man, Andrew, points out, pointing at the leashless white leather collar around Near’s neck. “No leash, no master.”

“He’s mine,” Mello growls, holding up his arm so the man sees the cuffs linking them together. “He has a health problem so he can’t have pressure on his throat but he’s still mine.”

“Those are both lies,” Near speaks up. “I’m not even sexually interested in men.”

“You aren’t?” Andrew asks, clearly confused by this fact. “Why are you here then?”

“It’s like a sitcom,” Mello says, not missing a bit. “We’re roommates. Accidentally locked together without a key, you know the bit. Come on Near, I need to use the bathroom.”

“Again?” Near asks. But Mello is already pulling him along.

They do go to the bathroom but there is a line, so Mello leads him through a door instead, out into the night air which is cool without being cold. It feels strangely quiet outside after being indoors with all that throbbing music. Near watches his own breath in the air, marveling at the sensation of being outside after dark, and then he watches Mello unbutton his blank leather pants and pull his dick out right in public like he doesn’t have a care in the world.

“You could get cited for public indecency,” he informs the blond, staring at him as he pisses on the side of the dumpster despite himself. He doesn’t want to watch but he feels like he has to. Is this how it feels to be Matt “Also, it smells disgusting out here.”

“Yeah, because we all piss out here and nobody gives a shit,” Mello replies. The splashing sound still fills the air between them. “Do you have to go?”

“Not out here like a wild animal.”

“I’m not waiting for that line so if you have to go then go.” Mellow begins to button up.

Near sighs but he does have to go so he looks around just to make sure nobody is around and pulls out his cock. The relief rips a moan from his throat. He aims at the exact same spot where Mello had just finished, feeling like a dog marking another dog’s territory. He doesn’t know what he finds this strangely satisfying.

“I can’t believe that jackass,” Mello fumes as he waits for Near to finish. “Just coming up to you and trying to pick you up like that. You’re clearly with me. I ought to fucking kill him.”

“That’s exactly what you’re not supposed to be doing right now,” Near reminds him as he buttons up his shorts once more. “Mello, how do you wear leather so much? These things barely cover my balls and I already feel like I’m swimming in my own sweat.”

“That’s because your thighs are fat,” Mello says but he’s just being mean now because Near doesn’t really have fat thighs. They’re not as lean as Mello’s but they’re shapely and nice and he kind of wants to touch the area where the short shorts stop, and the skin begins.

“Can we go home?” Near asks, checking the watch on his free wrist. “It’s nearly eleven.”

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Mello lets out a barking laugh. He’s a blur of blond hair and red lips when he moves. “We just barely got here. Come on, let’s go find a room.”

“A room?”

A room is more than four walls, as Near soon learns. Mello leads him down a hallway of doors. The music sounds diluted, and the hallway seems to get narrower and darker as they move down it but Near’s head is still spinning. He has to use his hand on the wall to steady himself, but Mello is moving along quickly, his boots echoing on the tile floor, and Near is pulled along, stumbling behind him.

The doors appear to be made of black corkboard and every single door has a series of laminated cards tacked on them. Near has no idea what the symbols on the cards are except some have a large green O and some have a large red X and he assumes that means whether or not anybody is allowed inside them. The rest are lost on him completely. He has no idea what a yellow bird or a swing set can symbolize. Mello finds one with an O that he apparently likes because he turns over the O and on the other side is an X and he tacks it back onto the corkboard before leading Near inside.

There’s only one person inside. A man who’s so skinny that every breath he takes exposes a set of ribs straining above the rope that is tied so tightly around his stomach that Near expects he’ll wake up with rope burn tomorrow. There’s also ropes around both wrists, which are stretched out on both sides of him, and his ankles, which are tied together so that his feet overlap beneath him without touching the ground. He is suspended in air with these ropes and Near’s skin chafes and aches just thinking about it.

The man has been crucified except there are no nails piercing his flesh. There is also no crown of thorns. And nothing hiding his nudity from Mello’s excited eyes.

“Peter,” Mello purrs, clearly happy with his selection. The man’s head tilts up. He has long, dishwater blond hair that falls over his shoulders. Though he heard Mello say his name he cannot confirm the voice because there is a blindfold over his eyes, covering half his face.

There’s a mumble but the gag in the man’s throat makes it impossible for him to speak. Near suspects if the gag wasn’t in the way he would have pretty, full lips, but that might just have to do with their bruising.

“Yes, it’s me, Xanatos” Mello confirms. “It’s been awhile, Peter. I have a friend with me today. You’re okay with that, right?”

The man nods and Near can already see the cock between the man’s leg hardening. It’s pierced, of all things, and Near feels faintly nauseated by the sight of it. It’s a tiny replica of the crucifix the man is tied too. Probably a preacher’s son. Or some kid who had been molested by his town’s priest one too many times.

“This will be fun,” Mello says, a little smile on his face. He reaches into the pocket of his pants and Near watches him extract a small white pill which he brings to his lips. “Near, I’m afraid I’m not the best with my left hand. Do you know how to use a whip?”


End file.
